Our Team
Scholars who teach and practice, in and out of the classroom.
The people who lead Soltara’s work have spent their careers closing the gap between research and practice. They facilitate the processes they have spent years studying. The projects they design are inspired by scholars who produce the evidence they draw on — which means they can be tailored to context, sector, and the specific pressures your organisation faces.
Dr. Lina Daouk-Öyry
Founding Partner
Lina Daouk-Öyry works with organisations navigating complexity, disruption, and cross-cultural environments, bringing organisational psychology and applied diagnostics to the problems leaders cannot solve with standard management tools.
Lina Daouk-Öyry is a Professor of Management and Organisational Psychology at BI Norwegian Business School whose work examines how individuals and organisations navigate complexity, disruption, and inequality across diverse cultural and institutional contexts.
Her research spans three domains: cross-cultural organisational behaviour in the Arab MENA region; healthcare organisations; and extreme contexts marked by crisis and disruption. She led the development of the first indigenous model of personality in the Arab world, a landmark in context-sensitive psychometric research, and has published extensively on evidence-based management, job crafting, healthcare management, and organising under crisis conditions.
Lina’s consulting practice focuses on organisational development, leadership, management systems, team effectiveness, and evidence-based organisational change. She has advised, trained, and worked with clients across aviation, healthcare, banking, and technology, supporting leaders and organisations to navigate complexity, disruption, and cross-cultural work environments. Her practice combines organisational psychology, applied research, facilitation, diagnostics, and leadership development to strengthen how people and systems perform.
More recently, her research has focused on migration and inclusive employment and leadership in the Nordic context. She currently supervises an EU-funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions postdoctoral fellow on the INSKILLS project, examining how institutional, organisational, and relational dynamics shape the career trajectories of spouses of highly skilled migrants in Europe.
Following the Beirut port explosion, Lina and her colleagues developed scholar-activist initiatives to support affected communities, work recognised by AACSB International’s Innovations that Inspire. She is also an Adjunct Professor at the American University of Beirut.
Dr. Carmen Geha
Founding Partner
Carmen Geha works with governments, international organisations, companies, and civil society on governance, gender policy, and institutional change across the Mediterranean, MENA, and Europe. Carmen Geha is a scholar, entrepreneur, and international development specialist with 20+ years of experience at the intersection of governance, women’s inclusion, civil society, civic engagement, and institutional change across the Mediterranean, North Africa, and Europe. She leads Soltara as Co-Founder and Managing Director.
Carmen is also Associate Fellow at Chatham House, Research Fellow at the European Institute of the Mediterranean, and lecturer in universities in Barcelona including GBSB Business School and the International University of Catalunya.
Her work spans multi-country employer inclusion programmes, parliamentary governance training, diaspora and migration research, civil society capacity building, and gender-responsive policy design.
Carmen’s consulting practice focuses on international development, governance, civic engagement, diaspora engagement, and gender-responsive institutional change. She has advised and consulted for international organizations, UN agencies, donors, think tanks, public institutions, civil society organizations, and private sector actors across MENA, Europe, and the Mediterranean. Her applied work includes programme design, evaluation, stakeholder consultation, policy analysis, leadership training, and capacity building for inclusive governance and women’s rights.
Carmen was Tenured Associate Professor of Public Administration and Leadership at the American University of Beirut, where she spearheaded programs and initiatives securing multi-million dollar funding for research and students. She was Founding Director of the Scholarship Program for Afghan Women and Co-Principal Investigator for Support and Accelerate Women’s Inclusion (SAWI project).
Carmen has been a Fulbright Scholar at Harvard University, Maria Zambrano Scholar at Pompeu Fabra University, Visiting Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study, Visiting Fellow at the University of Witswaterstrand, and Associate Faculty at IBEI Barcelona. She holds a Ph.D. in International Relations from the University of St Andrews and has published in Middle East Journal, Middle East Law and Governance, Citizenship Studies, Journal of Refugee Studies, Social Movement Studies, and Women, Politics and Policy, among others.
Dr. Charlotte Karam
Founding Advisor
Charlotte Karam advises organisations on inclusive HR systems, ethical leadership, and workplace accountability, translating peer-reviewed research into practical frameworks that hold up under regulatory scrutiny and institutional pressure. Charlotte Karam is a scholar-practitioner whose work bridges inclusive HR systems, business ethics, responsible leadership, public policy, and feminist praxis. She holds the Ian Telfer Professorship in Inclusive HR Systems at the Telfer School of Management, University of Ottawa, and was appointed Co-Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Business Ethics in July 2025.
Her research has been cited more than 3,950 times as of June 2026 and appears in over 30 peer-reviewed journals including Organization Studies, the Journal of World Business, Business Ethics Quarterly, and Gender, Work and Organization.
Charlotte’s practice focuses on inclusive employer policies, responsible business, ethical leadership, workplace accountability, and gender-responsive HR systems. She is a sought-after trainer and advisor for organizations seeking to build fairer, safer, and more inclusive workplaces across sectors including higher education, healthcare, financial services, and public policy. Her consulting and applied research translate evidence into practical employer tools, leadership programmes, policy frameworks, and measurement systems.
As primary investigator, Charlotte has led an interdisciplinary team that secured multi-million dollar grants from the US Department of State’s Middle East Partnership Initiative, UN Women, UNDP, the EU, Canada, Sweden, and Lebanon. This work produced the KIP and Lived Experience Indices: the first sector-based measures of women’s recruitment, retention, and promotion in MENA workplaces. It was recognised by AACSB International’s Innovations that Inspire in 2022.
Charlotte was named among Apolitical’s 100 Most Influential People in Gender Policy and acknowledged by the US Department of State as a Global Gender Champion. In 2024, the Financial Times selected her as one of its Problem Solvers for the Planet for her research on gender-based violence and business responsibility in the context of intimate partner violence.
Prior to the University of Ottawa, she spent over thirteen years at the American University of Beirut as a tenured professor, department chair, associate dean of programmes, and founding director of the Center for Inclusive Business and Leadership for Women. She remains affiliated with AUB as adjunct professor and senior fellow of the Asfari Institute.
Dr. Zeina Zeidan
Founding Advisor
Dr. Zeina Zeidan is a Board Chair, Independent Director, and International Finance Corporation (IFC) Certified Corporate Director with more than 25 years of experience in executive leadership, corporate governance, ESG, and institutional transformation across financial services, industrial companies, and public sector organizations.
She was the first woman to chair the board of a financial institution in Lebanon and has held senior leadership roles across the MENA region, including as CEO and CFO of multinational companies operating across MENA, Turkey, and Cyprus. She currently serves as a Member of the International Council of Transparency International, Board Member of the Investment Development Authority of Lebanon (IDAL), and Independent Board Member of Société des Ciments Libanais (CEMLEB, formerly Holcim Liban, listed on the Beirut Stock Exchange) and MSIS in Saudi Arabia.
An IFC-certified trainer of corporate directors, Dr. Zeidan designed and leads Lebanon’s national governance program for newly appointed members of public boards. She is also the author of Boardroom Signals, a monthly newsletter on board leadership, ESG, and financial governance. Her work supports organizations in strengthening accountability, board effectiveness, and sustainable business strategies.
She holds a Doctorat en Sciences de Gestion (Ph.D. in Management Sciences) from Université Aix-Marseille III, France, awarded with the highest distinction.